Dr Chandrapal Singh is a master at detecting disease merely by feeling the pulse of his patients. He practices the ancient method of nadi nidan as recommended in ancient Ayurveda texts.

It's a moot point if he was able to detect what went wrong with his second daughter, Puranchetanand Giri, better known as Sadhvi Pragya Thakur, who has been arrested by the Mumbai police's Anti Terrorist Squad in connection with the bomb blast in Malegaon on September 29.

Pragya's arrest is a turning point in the ongoing heated political debate over terrorism, home-grown terrorists and related issues like political rights and duties of the minority and majority communities in India. The stereotype-breaking police allegation against Pragya and her associates is the first time Hindus have been linked to terrorism in India.

Is Pragya Thakur involved in planting bombs in Malegaon as the ATS would like us to believe? Is she the first Hindu woman terrorist in India? Has she been trapped for political reasons? Is she a believer in rabid Hindutva trapped in a police case or did she participate willingly in a terrorist act to protest against jihadi terrorism?

These are pertinent questions. The ATS is searching for more evidence with the help of forensic tests like narco-analysis, psycho-profiling and lie-detector tests.

Meanwhile, rediff.com's Sheela Bhatt travelled to Surat where she spoke to Pragya's father Dr Chandrapal Singh to know more about the sadhvi's early life.

Dr Chandrapal Singh is a committed Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh worker for the last 35 years and believes in its core ideology of Hindu rashtra. He claims he personally knows the RSS supremo K S Sudarshan and Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi.

When the conversation was in progress, Pragya's mother Sarla Devi interrupted to say that Modi had even visited their home. (However, rediff.com was unable to confirm this).